Van Gogh's Sunflowers

The vibrancy of Van Gogh’s Sunflowers is arresting. 

In a room filled with some of the best paintings of all time, the Sunflowers blow them away.

Seeing them today, I can absolutely relate to the feeling of excitement that he must have felt when his good friend and colleague Gaugin was coming over to his house in Arles, that he wanted to brighten he room. 

That’s the magic of the Sunflowers. I’ve never seen the intensity of such a painting before, and it almost feels like he’s cheating or conducting some magic.

And yet there’s the twist — The brightness stems from the heavy metals that compose the paint. It’s likely that the act of creation cost the artist his sanity.

These flowers aren’t the freshly cut that adorn still life scenes aplenty. They’re old and dying… yet in the act of decay sunflowers seed and create new life.

Perhaps like Van Gogh himself, they have to go through a certain death to be reborn, realised and fully appreciated.

That one painting of simple flowers can capture the imagination of millions, fail to be recognised in its time and yet bloom to inspire the world more than a century later is nothing short of brilliant.